Ian Mayes
[8] Mayes began writing for The Guardian as a freelance in 1962, his first piece being a story on the features page (then edited by Brian Redhead) about the return of Laurie Lee to the village of Slad in Gloucestershire, where Cider with Rosie was set.[2][3] Other British newspapers, including The Observer, The Independent on Sunday and the Daily Mirror, quickly followed suit in appointing readers' editors, although Mayes was the only one to do the job full-time.[10] Through an influential weekly column called "Open Door",[12] Mayes dealt with corrections and clarifications (14,000 in his decade in the post),[13] as well as conducting a debate on the ethics of journalism.A translated selection of the columns was produced by Moscow State University under the title Rabota nad oshibkami (Work on mistakes).[9] Mayes was instrumental in the project to restore William Hazlitt's grave,[24] after visiting the original neglected gravestone in St Anne's Churchyard early in 2001.